Council of Europe and the European Convention on Human Rights

Debate between Stephen Doughty and Linsey Farnsworth

Wednesday 5th November 2025 Westminster Hall

[Linsey Farnsworth]

On the subject of criminal co-operation, before I came into Parliament I was an international liaison prosecutor. My job was to get evidence from overseas and help to get people overseas in Europe extradited to the UK for prosecution. That work relies on the ECHR, which underpins that legislation. Does the Minister share my concern about what some Members in this Chamber are proposing? Does he agree that they should be the ones who talk to a victim of rape about why her case cannot go forward because we cannot get the evidence from a European country, or tell a mother that we cannot get the murderer of her son back because we have left the ECHR?

[Stephen Doughty]

My hon. Friend makes some incredibly powerful and strong points, with which I concur. She highlights the very serious consequences that could come were we to leave the ECHR.

Before I turn to some of the other specific points, I want to compliment the wider work of the Council of Europe and the Parliamentary Assembly in expelling Russia following the illegal invasion of Ukraine, supporting Ukraine and seeking to hold Russia to account for the atrocities it has committed. I also compliment its work on the register of damage, the international claims commissions and the special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine established under the auspices of the Council. Those, along with the activities that my hon. Friend just raised, all matter to the British public and to British public life.

Of course, the ECHR plays a crucial role in our constitutional framework. It is an important pillar of the devolution settlements, it underpins the guarantees in the Good Friday agreement, and it supports the safety and security of British citizens by facilitating cross-border law enforcement and judicial co-operation. The ECHR is often presented as some sort of foreign imposition that does nothing to help British people. That literally could not be further from the truth. It has contributed significantly to the protection and enforcement of human rights and equality standards in the UK. We are very proud that a Labour Government incorporated the ECHR into domestic law—that was, of course, a decision of Westminster—by introducing the Human Rights Act 1998, which came into force 25 years ago last month.

The ECHR has had a massive impact. ECHR rulings in 1982 led to the end of corporal punishment in schools in the UK and to the decriminalisation of homosexuality in Northern Ireland. As has been referenced, in 1999, following a landmark case brought by two British servicepeople dismissed from the armed forces simply for being gay, an ECHR ruling led to the law being changed to allow members of the armed forces to be open about their sexuality. Another very powerful example concerns the impact of the Hillsborough disaster, which the Prime Minister has done much to lead on in recent months. The families of the 97 who lost their lives relied on the ECHR’s right to life provision when they campaigned for the truth. My hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Ms Creasy) spoke powerfully in this debate, including about the case of John Warboys. The benefits are not just historical; they affect live and significant cases that affect British people today.

Last, I turn to the question of reform. The strength of the convention is that, while the ECHR explicitly safeguards those at risk of harm, exclusion or discrimination, helps ordinary people to challenge unfair laws, and pushes Governments to respect rights, it is also entirely reasonable and appropriate for Governments consistently to consider whether the law, including the ECHR, is evolving to meet modern-day challenges, including on irregular migration, asylum and criminal justice. The ECHR was never designed to be set in stone and frozen forever in the time that it was created. That is why we are working with and engaging with European partners to look at ways in which reform can go forward, and why we are reviewing the way in which the ECHR is interpreted in UK domestic law.